“Ah, yes,” the king said, pushing up to stand, throwing his hands out in an expansive gesture. He descended the dais once more. “For as certain as tomorrow will bring snow, the Queen carries a prince who will join us by Winter Tithe.”
He paused at her side. She leaned in—but when he reached out, it was to touch her rounded belly, not her face. The queen covered the disappointment well, a catlike smile stealing over her features as the king touched her stomach reverently.
The warning I’d felt, the slight distrust… it bloomed. Lady Margeaux. Queen Anais. My father—the king himself.
He left his pregnant wife to clap a hand on my shoulder. Unlike my mother, he towered over me. A herald of what was to come for me when I reached maturity. But the hand on my shoulder was harder than it needed to be. Possessive.
“My son,” the King proclaimed, “the Duke of Sein Talam.”
Sein Talam. It was the name of the old fae kingdom, before Velora’s curse, when the fae had retreated to Balar Shan. My mother had sketched out a brief history of this kingdom over the last thousand years. There was no dukedom of Sein Talam in any of the peerages we’d pored over. This was a title created for me.
All at once, the courtiers around us bowed. The king’s grip on my shoulder tightened as he forced me to turn, to take in the hundreds of supplicants going to their knees.
The Duke of Sein Talam. A title created to control me.
I had been so naïve. This was not a homecoming, a blessed reunion of family too long separated by circumstance. Balar Shan was a battlefield, and it was time I learned to fight.
CHAPTER 12
GARRICK
I knewthat one day my father would die by my hands. I had killed dozens of people over the years. Some for bounty, others for sport. But I’d never hated any of them like I did the fae king. Until the Dark God convinced the woman I loved to sacrifice herself by remaining in the most dangerous place in all of Velora.
“You’ve gotten stronger, brother,” Edmund said, his handsome face twisting into an easy grin.
Edmund had been born into an easy life. He was the trueborn son of Balar Shan. The prince. Not an invented duke. I’d never begrudged him the crown; only the ease with which he’d found his place in the world.
This time, Edmund did not bring just one of his lackeys. More than a dozen sets of feet pounded into the floor behind him. My mind gifts were strong, but even I could not compel that many at once. Still, I would have fought them. I gripped the pommel of my greatsword. Rolled my shoulders to reassure myself with the familiar weight of the bow and quiver of arrows. I’d have gambled on my fae immortality in a second if Koryn had changed her mind. But my witch was stubborn.
She squared her shoulders and stared down the bevy of guards, one hand reaching for Isanara. She caressed the base of one of the wickedly sharp spikes that lined the dragon’s back as Edmund’s guards surrounded us.
The little dragon hissed, the sound seeping between her sharp, snapping jaws.
“I am not the one you should be concerned about,” I said, although my sword was still raised.
I’d never seen Isanara breathe fire, but there were plenty of legends about her kind. Edmund was welcome to test them, if he was stupid enough.
I waited for the Dark God’s acerbic laugh, or for Edmund’s brows to launch into his hairline at finding us with someone he did not recognize. The blasted god was everything I’d expected, plus a sarcasm that grated against my last nerve. I would not give him the grace of paying him any extra attention. The Dark God might be the greater threat, but Edmund and his guards were the present one.
“Try to encircle me with fire again, and you will feel my frost,” Koryn hissed, the sound an echo of her familiar.
Edmund’s grin only widened. And the Dark God?—
The Dark God was gone.
The space where he’d inserted himself between Koryn and me was entirely vacant. But his words and their consequences lingered, even if he’d made himself invisible. I’d known that he could not be trusted. He was the Dark God. The embodiment of evil and death and darkness in Velora. But I’d believed our goals aligned.
I was wrong. I’d made the wrong choice—again—and again, Koryn would be the one to pay.
This choice was hers, an inner voice corrected. So was the choice to enter the temple at the Mercy Gate. Others tried to manipulate her, but Koryn chose. She chose to enter the templeto spare her sister’s descendant. She chose to save me at the Mercy Gate. She chose to stay in Balar Shan to try to stop Maura and the king from bringing even more evil down on Velora.
Again and again, Koryn chose goodness. Gods, how I loved her.
But her choices did not absolve those who would use her for their own purposes. That list now included the Dark God. I was still at the top. But she’d let me help her liberate Isanara. That was progress, however small.
“Interesting choice, brother,” Edmund cracked, flicking his amused gaze my direction.
Mistake.
